


Beautiful

by Cats_Dont_Float



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Body Image, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Karkat Needs a Hug, M/M, Scars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-09-17
Packaged: 2020-10-20 03:47:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20668799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cats_Dont_Float/pseuds/Cats_Dont_Float
Summary: Karkat really doesn't like how he looks. Dave wishes his boyfriend knew how beautiful he is.





	Beautiful

Its yet another night on the meteor, and Karkat's making you watch yet another shitty romcom. It's one of his troll movies, and you lost track of the story line ages ago, so now you're just sort of watching Karkat watch the movie. He's leaning in far too close to the screen, the glow from it lighting up his grey face and shining off of his wide eyes. He seems to notice your eyes on him, because he turns slowly, and presses a quick kiss to your lips before turning back to his movie. That's new: the kissing.  
He told you a few weeks ago that he was feeling 'fucking horns over heels flushed' for you and well... you'd been thinking about telling him basically the same thing for ages, so now you've got this relationship to add to the list of weird things that have happened on this meteor. But really, you're just glad you've got him with you on this lonely fucking rock.  
The movie's almost over, and he's sniffling slightly over the mention of a character who died near the start of this far too long movie. So you reach out, take his hand that's resting on your knee, and raise it up to brush your lips against his knuckles. He looks over and gives you a small smile, his cheeks lightly flushed that candy-red colour that he's so ashamed of. In the glow from your laptop screen, you can see every dark freckle against his grey skin. You've tried to count them before, when he's fallen asleep long before you were tired enough to even think about sleeping, but every time you look there seem to be more, creeping across his cheeks and nose and all over his arms.  
"What are you looking at, idiot?" He mumbles after a few moments, and when you look back away from his face you realise the movie's ending.  
"You," is your reply, and you poke him on the end of the nose as you say it. He scrunches his nose up in a way that's far too adorable, recoiling backwards dramatically. "Seriously Kar, you're beautiful," you tell him softly as the credits roll, because you know he needs to hear it sometimes.  
"Am not," he grumbles, his voice muffled because he's shifted to lean his head against you, face pressed into your neck. You sigh, because it's obvious he's going to take more convincing than that, and close the laptop before leaning over to put it down on the floor by the side of your bed.  
"Karkat, are you trying to break my heart?" You ask, wrapping an arm around him and pulling him a little closer to you. "Can't believe you don't know how pretty you are."  
"Strider, fuck off." He growls, and though its quiet it's still obviously an angry growl, not a joke one. "I am not 'pretty', I'm a fucking disgrace. I'm too short, my horns are so small they might as well not even be there, and, oh yeah, I'm a fucking mutant who should have been culled sweeps ago!"  
You sigh, a heavy sigh that shakes your shoulders and just about puts across how much his words upset you. Because you know he hates himself. How could he not after a lifetime of being told he's unworthy of anything but death? But you just want him to see what you see; you want him to see the beauty in everything he is.

"Karkat," you murmur softly as you think of something, and he lifts his head up to blink at you owlishly. "Do you trust me?" You ask. He nods instantly, his nod so ferocious that his hair flops over his face, and you can't help a small smile. "Okay, just trust me here," you tell him, and then reach out for his sweater. He bites at his lip, one eyebrow raises curiously as you tug at the thick black material, until he gets the idea and lift his arms, letting you pull it off with ease. He's wearing a loose black shirt underneath, and he shrugs this off too without you even having to ask. Then he sits back a little, sitting cross-legged on the bed, and squints at you as he tries to work out what you're doing.  
You've seen him without his shirt on a few times before, mostly when he's thrown it off after training sessions up on the meteor's roof, when a sword's hit him slightly too hard or he's too hot in the stifling material. But even so, the sight still takes your breath away slightly. The grey skin is paler here on his stomach, where the light never gets to it, scattered with a few freckles but not so many. He's not thin, and you've heard him call himself fat before, but he's not, he's just slightly chubby in a way that makes him look so soft and welcoming. (You'd cuddle up to him right now and demand he never let go if you didn't have a job to do at that moment.) Further down his torso there are thick, raised, bright red scars, two on either side of his stomach, curving in towards where his belly button would be if trolls actually had those. They're grub scars, he's told you this before, something about losing his baby legs. Sounds horrifying, and you don't think you want to know much more about it than you already do. And there are other scars across his body too: raised scars across his shoulders and back, and smaller ones scattered here and there. They're all injuries from the game, and a few from his childhood, you think. They're nothing like yours, but you know how much he hates them, and lean down to press a few soft kisses to some of the larger scars on his arms and stomach. He giggles as you do this, pushing you back very slightly. He's only wearing shorts, and you rest your hands gently on his thighs, rubbing your thumbs in circles on the soft, warm skin as you sit back up to look him in the eyes. He's always warm, like his blood's boiling hot inside of him. It's probably another troll thing. You'll ask him about it some other time.  
"You're so beautiful, Kat," you tell him softly, "All of this is... perfect."  
"You're just saying that 'cos you're my matesprit," he mumbles. "I've got too many scars and I'm not skinny enough and it's just... it's not perfect, okay? It's just not." His eyes go teary, and he clenches his fists in frustration. He reaches out to grab his sweater, and you stop him by quickly pulling off your own shirt.  
He stops.  
He's not seen you shirtless before, you realise as he stares. You don't think you've ever let anyone see your body like this before. You feel anxious, but you tell yourself that you're doing this for him, to show him he's not alone, and sit there, eyes cast downwards as he looks at you. His eyes travel up and down, over your skin and every single scar you've gathered over your life, and the tears in his eyes spill onto his cheeks. He wordlessly reaches out, and when you nod he traces his fingers over your pale skin and the even paler scars that mark it in every possible place.  
"What happened?" He asks quietly, his hand stopping on a huge patch of scar tissue on the upper part of your left arm.  
"Strife with Bro," you reply with a shrug.  
"And here?" This time his hand's on your left hip, fingers gently tapping the skin slowly.  
"Bro," you reply again, the word catching in your throat this time. This continues for far too long. Most of your scars are something to do with your brother, but there's the occasional one from the game, and others that you can't even remember getting. Some of them feel like a life time ago, and the stories are fuzzy as you relay them to Karkat.

Eventually, he lifts his hands up to your face, and rests his thumb against the scar across your lip. It's warm against your face, and you appreciate the feeling for a second as he holds it there. Then, because you are Dave Strider, idiot extraordinaire, with a skill for ruining tender moments, you stick out your tongue and lick his thumb.  
He flinches back with a small declaration of "Fuck you!" You reach out, hands on his shoulders and pull him back towards you and he lets out a tiny squeak of surprise, then his forehead gently falls against your chest.  
"I'm sorry," he mumbles eventually, "I... I didn't know you had scars like that and I kept saying mine were bad when you had them as well and I -"  
"Karkat, stop," you say, cutting off his rambling, "It's okay to not be happy with your body is. No one is all the time. But just know that you're beautiful to me, okay? I think you're perfect. And you gotta talk to me when you're feeling bad, promise?"  
"Okay," he mumbles tiredly against your chest, "Promise."  
"Good," you say. He leans back eventually, sitting up so he can look into your eyes (you took your shades off hours ago because he's the only person you really trust to look at your eyes). His eyes started changing colour half a year or so back, and they're just as bright red as yours now. He looks for a second, eyes not leaving yours, and then reaches out for one of your hands. He loves holding your hands, and though you're not really sure why, you're perfectly happy to let him do so as much as he wants. When you squeeze his hand, he squeezes it back almost instantly. 

After a few moments, he shifts slightly so he's laying down with his head in your lap, and you slowly drag your fingers through his hair. He purrs, the sound getting even louder as you start to gently stroke his horns.  
"I love you," you tell him quietly, and his purring gets louder.  
"I love you too," he replies over the sound of his purring. Then he lets out a tiny yawn, and rubs at his face.  
"Time for some sleep, I think," you say, rolling him over and then laying down so his back's pressed up close to your stomach. You wrap your arms around his waist, hands on his hips, and he rests his hands gently on top of yours. As you lay there, you think of something else, and lean your head down to quietly tell him, "Hey, Kar, I've thought of another reason why I think you're beautiful."  
"What?" He murmurs, voice slurred as he gets tired.  
"Your eyes," you tell him, "Because they look just like mine."  
"Vain prick," he grumbles, and you laugh softly.  
"Not like that," you say, "Like, we match. And we've got that in common, no matter how different we are, you know? We're like a matching pair. Two peas in a pod. Soulmates."  
There's a long silence in which you think he's maybe fallen asleep, and the he mutters, "Go to sleep you daft idiot." You laugh softly, turning your hands to grab hold of his and squeeze gently. He curls up into an even smaller ball than before, and you wrap yourself more tightly around him, and the two of you slowly start to fall asleep.  
"Love you," you mumble, kissing his neck as he falls asleep. He mumbles something back that you barely hear and and then lets out a final yawn as he falls asleep. You smile, moving slightly to tuck your head under his chin, and close your own eyes, falling asleep just as quickly as he did.

**Author's Note:**

> Want to make this longer or more detailed soon, but this was just a little emotional self indulgent fic that I decided to post. I don't really know. Hope you liked it anyway! :)


End file.
